


The Secret Flower

by blaetter



Series: Christian Names [2]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (1984 TV), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Holmes picks a flower for Watson, M/M, Requited Love, daffodils, emotional Holmes, ill Watson, the meaning of daffodil is significant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-31
Updated: 2017-05-31
Packaged: 2018-11-07 09:12:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11055891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blaetter/pseuds/blaetter
Summary: Holmes picks a flower; Watson keeps it for three years.





	The Secret Flower

I have long since given up on attempting to diminish or eradicate my secret desire for Holmes. In the more fanciful days of my youth, I would have thought the love, settled as it is now deep in my chest, would devour me from the inside out. And I would have let it. But now, as a middle-aged man, I know otherwise. It sits more like an aethereal presence near my heart, always there, a touchstone of truth. I feel it acutely when I awake, when I am eating, when I look at Holmes, when I speak to him, when I fall asleep, when I stare out the window of our carriage and know Holmes is contemplating beside me. This deep-seated love has itself become my companion, and I would not trade it in for anything in the world. 

I fear, however, that however internalised this love has been cultivated, it seeps outward in ways others can detect. I know there would not be an intuitive person alive who would not suspect my love for Holmes, be it brotherly (as I try to simulate for everyone's sake) or much more (which it truly is). I try to keep it in check always, so that no harm would befall Holmes or his reputation upon its reveal, but I wonder sometimes whether I am truly capable of keeping such a roaring passion in check. 

This flower, for instance, which I keep in my book on the stand by my bed. Holmes brought it home once, a single daffodil, from one of his thinking walks (from the days when I would often not be invited; how times have changed now), and with no hidden meaning whatsoever, purely in a moment of absent deep thought, he set it down on my desk, picked up the book that was sitting there, and settled on the settee to browse it, all wordless in thought. 

It stayed there that day until he picked it up again, using it as some explanation in a deduction of his, and he set it down again carelessly on the small table by my chair in the sitting room. It stayed there until it wilted, and before Mrs Hudson could bin it, I snuck it to my room when Holmes was sleeping and pressed it in my bedside book. It has been there since, going on three years now, and I am positive Holmes did not know about it before this winter. 

I had fallen ill, bedridden, fearing that that dreadful 'flu had returned to finish the job it attempted all those desolate years ago. For an entire week, I was worth nothing more than lying on my back in bed, having Mrs Hudson flitter about; and after the fourth day, even Holmes made an appearance at my bedside. He did not tickle my foot awake, but instead hovered over me like a villain until I awoke. When I did open my eyes, groggily and hardly sentient, he narrowed his hawklike gaze and stared me down until I blinked and closed my eyes again. I heard some bustling about; when I opened my eyes again perhaps ten or twenty minutes later, Holmes was sat in the chair near my bed, which he had moved closer so that his knees were nearly touching my blankets, and was fiddling his fingers on his thighs and looking all over my rooms. 

I awoke then properly, afraid he would deduce something minute which would reveal me totally, but nothing seemed to particularly bother him. He seemed, as ever his nature, more curious about every speck than astonished at some telling find. 

‘Holmes, you needn’t stay,’ I rasped after a moment, realising this was probably dreadfully dull for him.

His eyes flew to mine at my words, then looked away quickly, then looked back with a smallish smirk, a sign I knew meant he was about to say something perhaps dangerous, perhaps even sentimental or silly. ‘The sitting rooms are empty without your pottering about,’ he says in a quiet tone, and I grinned because I was right. Both sentimental and silly.

‘You merely miss my irritating presence,’ I rasped, then coughed. Speaking was not well to do, but I was afraid he would leave, bored, if I were silent. 

He tutted. ‘You mustn’t talk, dear fellow. Here.’ To my surprise, he picked up my bedside book, a different one after three years, but one into which I had moved the flower-cum-bookmark. I attempted to sit up a bit for half a second, then dropped the notion as pain took me under. Holmes continued his thought: ‘I shall read to you.’

I lay back and counted two breaths, waiting for the silence I knew was coming. When I looked up again, he was looking at me, puzzled, and dare I say even emotional, even be it so hidden from the world save my intimate knowledge of the man. 

‘You kept it,’ he murmured. He sounded awed. I had kept what?

‘The flower, three years ago, Watson, this is that flower.’

Not sure of my footing, nor what he was making of such daft sentiment, I simply nodded.

He stared at me a moment longer, then set the flower delicately -- I have never seen him so gentle with anything before -- back in the book, and stood.

It was over then, I was sure. I was only too sick in bed to pack and leave him, lest I spoil his reputation, or corrupt his innocent regard for me. Perhaps if I left immediately, some part of our friendship could be salvaged… Ah, but I could not even sit up in bed, I was in no state to leave him, not even to leave this bed. (I couldn’t leave him anyway, not to survive afterwards.)

His back was turned to me, his hands on his waist with his jacket flared out just that much, his thinking stance, just as he sized up the crime scene before beginning for clues. I expected him to stay like that before stalking off, leaving, never to look back, but then he turned to me and knelt by my bed, taking my hand in both of his.

‘Watson.’ That could not be wet eyes -- with Holmes, the concept was unthinkable. ‘You must tell me the meaning of this.’

I blinked and overturned my hand in his, not able to grasp it well given my strength. ‘You know, Holmes.’ I coughed once more. ‘You must know. This is it.’ If I were to die anyway in this forsaken bed, he would know my feelings. I could deny him no longer. 'You know,' I whispered.

His eyes grew large, unbelieving; he nodded, squeezed my hand, lifted my hand to his mouth and kissed my upturned palm, each of my fingers, his eyes still on mine. There was a quiet yet sharp inhale, his hands trembling against mine, and his voice likewise shook as he whispered, in apparent reverence, ‘ _John_.’

My face reddened. He knew, the devil, he knew and by gods in heaven, it was reciprocated. A shared love between us; if only I had not been ill, I would have kissed him then. The 'flu had the decency to end mere days afterward, and I did find my chance then, finally.


End file.
